In 2009, the former Grant MacEwan Community College transitioned to MacEwan University. The academic staff association seized the opportunity to push for the creation of a library council as part of the institution's shared governance structure, and secure tenure and promotion for its librarian members.
The experience at Grant MacEwan highlighted the ongoing struggle to secure academic rights, such as shared governance and academic freedom for librarians and archivists. Today, many academic librarians and archivists working in post-secondary institutions in Canada are covered by collective agreements that extend the same right to academic freedom as to faculty.
"It's the ultimate truth seeking," said Eva Revitt, librarian at MacEwan University. "It's important that librarians have academic freedom so that they can conduct scholarly research and because it "allows them to enact their professional practice based on our codes of ethics, rather than any administrative prerogative," Revitt added
The freedom of academic librarians to conduct scholarly activity is usually protected to the same standard as that of other academic staff within their collective agreements. CAUT's policy statement on Academic Freedom makes it clear that academic freedom extends to all academic staff. Moreover, as academic workers, librarians and archivists should have research, scholarship, and academic and community service as part of their normal workload requiring access to dedicated research time, sabbatical, leaves and funding.
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